Category: Cooking

What do I mean?? Well, if you’ve followed this little blog, you know I have purposely tried to eat healthy more often than not. For some reason that is easier to do during Fall, Winter, and Spring seasons, than summer. The long daylight hours, more physical activity, and hot weather just makes me hungrier. I eat more; which means I gain pounds usually. Frankly, healthy eating can get oooold!😒 (Because fattening food is more fun 😂).

This summer I really tried to just maintain. I did eat a few more calories per day, around 1500-1800 per day on average, but I also ‘moved’ more so I guess it all balances out because I lost 3 pounds overall this summer.

I’m that hard stage right now where weight loss is not the real issue, but just staying on a good path, eating food clean food, and moving my body.

Fall is a good time to REFRESH and REFOCUS!

Today I am encouraging and motivating myself so tomorrow, Monday’ I am ready! I will likely on Monday and Tuesday morning until 1pm drink lemon water, ACV (Apple Cider Vinegar), cayenne pepper, honey just to give my body a rest. (check here for more info on the drink – use your good sense people, I’m no doctor). Then I eat lots of veggies. This seems to give my mind and body time to get in sync and detox a bit.

I just found this information I had saved in my files… good motivation. Food really is medicine!

Over the past 14 months I’ve learned to listen to what my body is saying in terms of cravings. I now know if I am craving certain foods it’s usually due to my food intake being a little unbalanced. This table helped a lot.

The hardest part of eating healthy for me is keeping the food variety going strong. Once I find a healthy calorie-smart delicious food I tend to stick with it, but after a while even the most fave food can become b.o.r.i.n.g. So, I am always in search of new and different (but not too crazy) foods.

Here are some foods I rarely ate before that are now a part of my regular food list:

cottage cheese

Spaghetti squash

mustard

eggs (straight from the farm)

riced cauliflower

A couple weeks ago I discovered a new food. Flatout light flat bread! Oh my! It’s perfect! I eat a lot of red/yellow/orange/green peppers, cubes, sweet onions, and lettuce…basically salad…but after eating so many of them, even I was getting a little bored with them.

These wraps come in plain, wheat, and spinach as far as I know. I bought spinach, and I wrapped up some veggies, tuna salad (made with tuna, a boiled egg and cottage cheese, yes cottage cheese). It looked sorta nasty but great day it was so good.

I’ve since had wraps with egg salad, veggies alone, and turkey breast slices.

Needless to say, I have an extra package of wraps in my freezer. Going to try making a flat bread pizza next.

The hardest part of eating healthy for me is keeping the food variety going strong. Once I find a healthy calorie-smart delicious food I tend to stick with it, but after a while even the most fave food can become b.o.r.i.n.g. So, I am always in search of new and different (but not too crazy) foods.

Here are some foods I rarely ate before that are now a part of my regular food list:

cottage cheese

Spaghetti squash

mustard

eggs (straight from the farm)

riced cauliflower

A couple weeks ago I discovered a new food. Flatout light flat bread! Oh my! It’s perfect! I eat a lot of red/yellow/orange/green peppers, cubes, sweet onions, and lettuce…basically salad…but after eating so many of them, even I was getting a little bored with them.

These wraps come in plain, wheat, and spinach as far as I know. I bought spinach, and I wrapped up some veggies, tuna salad (made with tuna, a boiled egg and cottage cheese, yes cottage cheese). It looked sorta nasty but great day it was so good.

I’ve since had wraps with egg salad, veggies alone, and turkey breast slices.

Needless to say, I have an extra package of wraps in my freezer. Going to try making a flat bread pizza next.

Ha! That title so corny, but it cracked me up [pun intended] 😂 Seriously, I’m about to discuss eggs… just in case my corny introduction has failed. 😏

I remember back when the poor little egg got a very bad rap for the cholesterol it contains. Everyone treated the egg like it suddenly got “cooties” and I’m sure ‘somebody’ made a whole lot of money ….. but it wasn’t egg farmers. Thousands of yolks went down the drain and the world of bland egg white omelets was born. *blech*.

I wasn’t a huge egg eater anyway, and my cholesterol levels were toward the low end at the time anyway so I paid little attention to how many eggs I had in my diet.

Fast forward years later, I run across an article from a doctor who was touting eating up to 12 eggs a day for health.😳🤔 Then I started seeing more and more egg promos. So, why the gradual fading of the Scarlet ‘E’? I don’t know.

Anyway, a year ago when I started focusing on my health, I needed a good protein sources that didn’t involve a lot of beef and chicken. Eggs seemed to be the way to go, but I wondered about their benefits or risks.

I found a newsletter on healthline.com (Top 10 Health Benefits of Eating Eggs) that pretty much sums up what a lot of other articles stated. You can read it here. The following is an excerpt from the newsletter.

********************************************1. Eggs Are Incredibly NutritiousEggs are among the most nutritious foods on the planet. A single large boiled egg contains : Vitamin A: 6% of the RDA. Folate: 5% of the RDA. Vitamin B5: 7% of the RDA. Vitamin B12: 9% of the RDA. Vitamin B2: 15% of the RDA. Phosphorus: 9% of the RDA. Selenium: 22% of the RDA.

Eggs also contain decent amounts of Vitamin D, Vitamin E, Vitamin K, Vitamin B6, Calcium and Zinc. This is coming with 77 calories, 6 grams of protein and 5 grams of healthy fats. Eggs also contain various other trace nutrients that are important for health.

2. Eggs Are High in Cholesterol, But They Don’t Adversely Affect Blood Cholesterol It is true that eggs are high in cholesterol. In fact, a single egg contains 212 mg, which is over half of the recommended daily intake of 300 mg. However… it’s important to keep in mind that cholesterol in the diet doesn’t necessarily raise cholesterol in the blood (4, 5).

3. Eggs Raise HDL (The “Good”) CholesterolHDL stands for High Density Lipoprotein. It is often known as the “good” cholesterol (9). People who have higher levels of HDL usually have a lower risk of heart disease, stroke and various health problems (10, 11, 12, 13).

4. Eggs Contain Choline – an Important Nutrient That Most People Don’t Get Enough of

Choline is a nutrient that most people don’t even know exists. Yet, it is an incredibly important substance and is often grouped with the B vitamins.

LDL cholesterol is generally known as the “bad” cholesterol. It is well known that having high levels of LDL is linked to an increased risk of heart disease (19, 20). But what many people don’t realize is that there are subtypes of LDL that have to do with the size of the particles.

6. Eggs Contain Lutein and Zeaxanthin, Antioxidants That Have Major Benefits For Eye Health

7. In the Case of Omega-3 or Pastured Eggs, They Lower Triglycerides as Well

8. Eggs Are High in Quality Protein, With All The Essential Amino Acids in The Right Ratios

Proteins are the main building blocks of the human body. They’re used to make all sorts of tissues and molecules that serve both structural and functional purposes. Getting enough protein in the diet is very important and studies show that currently recommended amounts may be too low.

Well… eggs are an excellent source of protein, with a single large egg containing 6 grams.

9. Eggs do NOT Raise Your Risk of Heart Disease and May Reduce The Risk of StrokeFor many decades, eggs have been unfairly demonized.

It has been claimed that because of the cholesterol in them, they must be bad for the heart. Many studies published in recent years have examined the relationship between egg consumption and the risk of heart disease.

10. Eggs Are Highly Fulfilling and Tend to Make You Eat Fewer Calories, Helping You to Lose Weight

Eggs are incredibly fulfilling. They are a high protein food… but protein is by far the most fulfilling macronutrient (47).

Eggs score high on a scale called the Satiety Index, which measures the ability of foods to induce feelings of fullness and reduce subsequent calorie intake (48).

For most of my adult life, my cholesterol was in the range of 170 – 200, even when I had put on excess weight. I was good with that. So when I lost 57 lbs over the year, I was excited to see how my cholesterol changed.Yes, I ate a lot more eggs. Each Sunday I boiled 6 eggs and ate them over the week. I didn’t think that was so many. I usually have one in the morning for breakfast with 1/4 to 1/2 cup of cottage cheese. It satiated me and kept the hunger away for a while.

Last week I had my cholesterol checked; one year ago it was 201. This week it was ….. 230!!!!! …. even after losing weight! I told the nurse my weight loss journey. She looked over my numbers and explained that even though my number was high, a doctor would not likely put me on any meds because my HDL (good cholesterol) was 71!!!! about double what they like to see, and my LDL (bad cholesterol) was low. Most important she said was that my overall ration was 3.2, which is lower than the <4.7 ratio they like to see. 🙂

So, even though it was high, it was high because of the elevation of all the good cholesterol I now have. Interesting huh?

I’m no doctor so I don’t know how to explain this any better than I have already. I’m NOT advocating that YOU go out and eat a dozen eggs per week. I’m just sharing what happened to me….and passing along some info.

Anyway…. Happy crackin’!

Peace and Love! ❤

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3:16

The past month of my life included more than usual travel. Some for business and some for pleasure; some in planes and some in cars.

It also included a whole lot of eating out. I’m not fond of eating out on a regular basis because restaurant food tends to have ‘more’ … more sodium, more fat, more sugar, and just plain more food. I chose carefully but still ate more than I usually do so I am glad to be home.

After a grocery store run this morning, my refrigerator looks normal again. I’m looking forward to eating mostly fresh vegetables, fruit and a bit of protein. Mainly because after eating out so much I feel … sluggish and … sleepy. It’s amazing how energetic I feel when I eat better. I really need not slip back into bad eating habits too; it’s sooo easy to do. The more junk I eat the more I crave. After a year of good eating, I rarely had cravings…but the last few days I have craved all kinds of stuff…and caved too. 😣 Oh well, the key is to get back on track right away.

10. Breakfast will probably be a boiled egg 🥚 and cottage cheese ( sounds nasty but is actually pretty good and a good hit of morning protein).

Lunch and/or dinner will include these foods along with a ton of water and a couple mornings of fasting.

Regarding the carrots, I don’t buy organic veggies unless they are on sale except for carrots (I buy whole carrots in the bag). I wash everything in vinegar water. However, I’ve noticed something about some non-organic carrots; they have little to no taste compared to organic carrots. Plus, non-organic carrots get slimy after a couple days when I cut them up. Organic carrots taste so good and carrot-y. 🥕🥕🥕

A couple summers ago I jarred my cut vegetables and it worked out nicely. Last year I was too lazy to do it and I was busy eating too much junk and gaining weight. 😏

That is my standard answer when asked about cooking. However, I think I will have to change that statement because I now cook nearly every week. Not because I enjoy it, but because I want healthy food in the house. Every Sunday I cook a bunch of stuff and have it for the remainder of the week. My evenings are typically filled and busy with things I need to get done, so I like to finish my day job, eat, then move on to my projects/commitments.

After stating “I don’t cook” to a person I met recently, she looked at me and said, “Well, what do you eat, do you eat out all the time?” I’m sure I had a crazy look on my face because in actuality, I DO cook. I guess in the past I thought of cooking as preparing a meal that included all the food groups for people to eat and survive on. I don’t do that. I just cook for myself, and there is no one to complain, and no one who has picky food choices, etc. I cook most vegetables the same way, in a little coconut oil, salt, pepper, and lot of spices … boring but tasty.

So, a typical Sunday includes getting home from church and washing, dicing, slicing, sauteing, steaming food … I guess you call that cooking, huh?

Today, I decided try a new vegetable. I went to a local farmer’s market and bought Swiss Chard. I recently watched a video to see how to prep and cook it. Looked simple enough; like the way I cook collards, spinach, kale, etc.

I gave it a bath (in water, white vinegar and baking soda) along with the other fruits and vegetables I bought today at the market. Everyone gets a bath, then a vegetable brush scrub – sometimes with dish soap. I know it sounds excessive…. but when I watch all the hands that touch vegetables at the markets its a wonder (if you know me) I don’t come home and throw them into the dishwasher.

Anyway, I ‘cooked’ the Swiss Chard and it was pretty tasty. Tastes similar to other green leafy vegetables but with it’s own distinct flavor. I will definitely add this to the food rotation list.

The way I handle eating healthy, by cooking all at the beginning of the week, might not be for everyone because by Thursday, I am usually completely sick of whatever I cooked; but fortunately it is mostly all gone by the end of the week. I have to have a large number of options because I cook 3-5 veggies per week so I need enough options to rotate. This week was this:

Red/Orange/Yellow peppers – I wrote about this in a previous post; a good snack veggie.

Collard Greens – I cheated this week and used bagged ones – I knew I was not going to want to spend all afternoon picking greens.

English Cucumbers – another good snack food

Yellow Squash – I eat a lot of this during the summer.

Swiss Chard – I bought one bunch. It shrunk down to about 3/4 of a cup. It was more expensive than I imagined – $2.49/bunch. I will have to catch this on sale in order to have enough for the week. LESSON LEARNED: Don’t be afraid to try new foods.

Decided to try Quinoa too – I read it is a great source of protein, which I need because as you see, I didn’t cook any chicken, or other meat for the week. I’m not vegan or anything, it’s just that I had beef twice last week and I’m not craving anything ‘meaty’ so I decided to skip a week of meat and just have eggs, cottage cheese, and quinoa as my protein. It was pretty tasty. Will likely add this to the rotation about once per month.

Bag of apples – was really inexpensive at the market

and Cantaloupe was on sale; not my favorite but will satisfy the craving until juicy, red, decently priced watermelons arrive.

Before you decide you can’t cook and eat like this all week, fret not, because I don’t either. This food makes up about 70% of my diet now.

I might throw in a slice of Ezekiel Bread and peanut butter one evening, or I might go out with friends and have a salad with chicken on it … or sometimes I might decide to have popcorn with sprinkled with hot sauce for a snack. The Sunday cooking is primarily a way to not get caught in a state of being really hungry and going for junk food because I don’t have good food in the house. It works for me…. might work for you.

Sooooo, maybe I am a cook after all…. but I still wouldn’t count on me to cook a full meal for ya…. unless you want a Veggie Plate. 🙂